What Fuels Our Church?

Sermon on Acts 4.32-34 The Reverend Scott Homer
In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Our furnaces are fired by coal or natural gas. Our cars are fueled by gasoline. Dragsters are fueled by nitro-enriched fuel and submarines and aircraft carriers are fueled by nuclear energy. The Church is fired by the Holy Spirit. And that is really important for us to remember because when you use the wrong type of fuel to operate your car you are likely to sputter and spit and quit—and getting it going again may be expensive and difficult. Engines are designed to be run by a specific fuel source. Only gasoline is able to fuel the typical car. Only nuclear fuel rods are able to power nuclear subs and only the Holy Spirit is able to power the Church. A Church that attempts to operate in human strength is destined to sputter, spit and eventually quit. With the proper fuel and with appropriate care and maintenance an engine can take us to all the places we could ever want to go. The Church needs to quit relying on human strength and start relying on the Holy Spirit.

In lifesaving courses, the rescuer is trained to swim behind the victim and to grab them in a choke hold. That is the safest way for them to save the victim and to preserve their own lives because people who are drowning don’t make wise choices, they panic, they become frantic and in their futile efforts to stay afloat they will just wildly grab onto anything and pull it down with them. If a rescuer is not careful about their approach they may end up drowning along with the victim. Logically you would think that a person who can’t swim would see a strong swimmer approaching and they would surrender control to them, but emotionally the drowning man refuses to give up control. He insists upon doing things his way to the bitter end. If he succeeds in getting his way, it will cost everybody their lives.

Now this is a very good illustration of our spiritual problem. Lives lived independent of God, seeking our own way, are lives lived in waters way over our heads. We may not be able to recognize the danger all the time. Swimmers often get caught in rip tides because they can’t sense it. But whether we can sense it or not, whether we know it or not, we are going to drown if we rely on our own devices. Sin and death are like a powerful undertow that is dragging us out into the deep and dragging us down below the surface. Struggle as we may we will eventually grow tired and weak and we will succumb.

Fortunately, we do not have to live independent of God. We may choose to. Many of us do but we don’t have to. We have been sent a rescuer. It is, in fact, one of the neglected teachings of the Easter season. In John 16.7 Jesus tells his disciples, "I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper [the Holy Spirit] will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you.” So, one of the central benefits of Jesus’ death, resurrection and ascension is that when Jesus departs the Holy Spirit arrives. God sends the Holy Spirit to us and in the Holy Spirit’s presence we receive power.

One of the greatest gifts of Christ’s sacrifice is the gift of God the Helper coming and living with us and through us. And how will we know this helper? What will he look like? In the Gospel of John chapter 4, verse 26 Jesus describes him as the Holy Spirit, the [One the] Father sends in [Jesus’] name. He teaches us all things. He reminds us about all of Jesus’ teachings, and in 15.26 Jesus says, "He is the Spirit of Truth who proceeds from the Father and He testifies about Jesus. And finally, he comes with great power and authority and he gives that power and authority to us. Submitted to this powerful presence the disciples perform miracles; they heal the sick, they speak the truth with such force that listeners are immediately convicted and surrender their lives to Christ; they forgive sins, a thing only God can do; and perhaps most stunningly, believers become generous and hospitable—Barnabas sells his land and lays the proceeds at the Apostles feet. Surely this sort of hospitality is only inspired by God’s powerful presence.

Now, returning to our analogy of the drowning man, the challenge for us individually and for the Church together is threefold:
1. To gather together and confess our sins to God and to one another
2. To exercise patience and discipline and to wait upon the Lord
3. To exercise courage by actually surrendering our life and will to God and allowing the Holy Spirit to move us and to act through us

That’s the great challenge. The great benefit, of course, is salvation—and that does not just mean going to heaven someday. Salvation means healing our broken hearts. Salvation means healing our broken relationships. Salvation means healing our broken world. Salvation means living in peace—knowing that we are being watched over and protected and cared for by the Master of the Universe and the Creator of all things, the God whose character is love. Salvation means being relieved of the burden of having to fix the immense problems facing us and our loved ones—and yet knowing that we can bring change into the midst of the most difficult situations. Salvation means joy independent of our circumstances. Salvation means feeling loved, not for what you do or who you know or how you act but loved just the way you are. When the Holy Spirit comes, when we are led into all truth, when the power of God dwells in our midst, we know salvation in all its manifestations. And we know the source of our salvation. And along with giving us the knowledge of the truth the Holy Spirit inspires us to shout out and proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ to the whole world—and because our words are powered by God’s Spirit they do not return to Him empty.

Gathering together—confessing our sins to one another—waiting upon the Lord—surrendering our life and will to God; this is the model of life that God repeatedly places before us in the Scriptures. Most especially we see it wrapped around the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus that we celebrate this Easter season.
In Acts chapter 1, verse 4, as Jesus prepares to ascend to heaven he:
4 Gathers [the disciples] together, and He [Jesus] commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, "Which," He said, "you heard of from Me; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now." 6 So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, "Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?"7 He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority; 8 but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth." 9 And after He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of their sight.
Acts chapter 2, verse 1:
“When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.
Acts chapter 4, verse 31:
“And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness.”

First, we have to gather together. God does not deal with us as individuals. He works with us as a community. And as we saw from John last week, a community is only a community when it is admitting its faults to one another. We have to acknowledge our ignorance of the truth, our willful refusal to do what is right and our intentional distance from Jesus.

Secondly, we must learn to wait for the Holy Spirit to arrive. We are always insisting on going off half-cocked. We are always jumping into things and exercising force and manipulation and subtle forms of violence in order to accomplish what we have concluded is right for everybody. We so want to be the source of salvation. And then we wonder why our efforts lack any real power, why we don’t see God honoring our efforts, why we seem to be beating our heads against the wall.

Thirdly, we must respond to the power of the Spirit by exercising the gifts the Spirit gives us. The Spirit brings preaching and teaching gifts. The Spirit empowers people to perform miracles, to heal the sick, to dream dreams and see the future God intends for us. The Spirit blesses us with real love for one another and a desire to welcome and support one another. The Spirit has given each of us gifts but we must recognize his working in our lives, acknowledge his blessing through us and use those gifts for God’s glory.

A church that is attempting to operate in its own strength is like a drowning man trying to swim to shore. If he knew how to swim he wouldn’t be in the mess he is in and rather than try and control the situation he needs to let go and allow his rescuer to grab hold of him, buoy him up and move him to safety.

The Church relies upon the power of the Holy Spirit. Without the Holy Spirit the Church withers and dies. A Church without the Holy Spirit is a Church without life—an empty shell—a whitewashed sepulcre—with no real ministry and no real purpose. America is full of churches that long ago abandoned the Holy Spirit and who are struggling to find a cause to fight for, searching for a reason to unlock their doors, and striving to tolerate one another. But a Church upon which the Holy Spirit has come and in which the Holy Spirit finds a welcome dwelling is a Church characterized by boldness, by tangible signs of transformation, and by genuine togetherness—real community—real bonds of affection. When the Holy Spirit falls upon us we are changed and we reflect that change in what we say, in what we do, and in the ways that we live with one another. We can’t help it because when the Holy Spirit comes we lose control. We are no longer in charge. The Church ceases to be our Church and it becomes God’s Church. Mission isn’t something people are searching for—it is an assigned project. We don’t come wondering how we can bend God’s will to our purposes—we find our will being conformed to God’s purposes. We don’t give lip service to love while we selfishly seek our own success. The Holy Spirit inspires us to sacrifice ourselves for the benefit of God and his people. Barnabas sells his land and places the proceeds at the feet of the apostles—not because he has to but because he recognizes the deep honor in it. When the Church is fueled by the Holy Spirit we cease to begrudge the few dollars we throw in the collection plate and we seek ways to give more because we are able to see the great honor in giving.

The Holy Spirit is showing up in our midst with power. We are seeing individual lives changed, God working to set people free, ministry being born out of sincere love of God, people experiencing the pleasure of serving their Lord through sacrificing for the community. Look at the Daughters of the King. They are not serving out of fear or ambition or obligation. They love what they are doing. Look at the Wild at Heart group. They have been inspired and they are boldly reclaiming ground for the Lord. Nobody really loves showing up to a Bible Study at 6:30am during the week unless the Holy Spirit is feeding them and blessing them in that study and he is. Financial Peace University, the new Community Meal initiative, our volunteers at Uncommon Grounds. We are witnessing the Holy Spirit moving in our midst, leading us into real, sincere, loving community and into bolder proclamation of the Gospel message.
We have no control over what God does. He is sovereign and he moves as he sees fit. But the Lord has promised that if we will gather together, if we will confess our sins to one another and to him, if we will wait patiently upon him and surrender to Him when he comes to us, he will come and we will know His power and his blessing in our lives. Amen.